Your One True Love (The Bennett Family 8)

“Hi, Dad. I’m at the hospital. Where are you exactly?”

“Eighth floor, don’t know the room number.”

“Doesn’t matter, I’ll find you. I’ll be there in a few minutes. I’ll find you.”

Don’t panic, Caroline. Don’t panic. I repeat this mantra from the second I end the conversation as I head to the elevator. I try to concentrate on the positive aspect: he answered. It means he’s not in surgery or in a coma. Both very good things. But why did he sound so weak, then?

Stepping out of the elevator, my eyes sweep around to identify whoever is part of the personnel. Scrubs. The first two I ask aren’t any more helpful than the lady on the ground floor, but the third time’s the charm.

“Oh, Martin Dunne. Yes, follow me. He wasn’t brought in too long ago.”

I follow the nurse through the labyrinth of corridors until we reach a small room with two beds. Only one is occupied, by my dad. I bite my tongue to keep from gasping. A scratch runs at the side of his head, from his cheek right up to his temple, and he’s white as a sheet. Somehow, he looks tiny in that bed, white linen up to his chest.

“Hey, baby girl.”

“What happened?” I look at the nurse, who holds up her hands to indicate she doesn’t know.

“I’m going to leave the two of you and take him up for a scan in about twenty minutes.”

As she leaves, I sit on the edge of Dad’s bed. He brings out a hand from under the sheet, and I grasp it reassuringly. Leaning in close, I inspect his scratch. Up close, I can see they smeared a yellowish substance along it. Okay, at least they took care of this.

“I’m okay, baby girl. Don’t you worry about me.”

He sounds and looks weak, and nothing at all like my dad, so worrying doesn’t even begin to cover it. I’m now actively fighting to keep the panic at bay. Little kids fall all the time, but a fall at his age is no joke.

“Did you hurt anything else besides your head?” I ask.

“Nah. Just a scratch. Doctor said I might have a concussion too.”

Oh, dear God. Again, at his age, that’s no small thing.

“What happened? You fell?”

He lifts his head, motioning to the glass of water on the small bedside table. Grabbing it, I hold it for him to drink. As he sips, I notice scratches on his left hand too, running up to his elbow. He fell on his entire left side, then?

“It was a weird morning,” he says after he’s done drinking. “Woke up earlier than usual because I had a delivery at the store. When I arrived, there were three guys out front. Never seen them in the neighborhood.” He pauses, frowns, as if he forgot his train of thought. As much as I want to know the whole story, I don’t push. “Didn’t look like they’d come to rob anything, were too relaxed. Too out in the open. One had a camera around his neck.”

I stiffen at the mention of the camera.

“They started asking me questions about Daniel. About you. Personal questions. I figured they were reporters, tried to shake them off. Kept following me around, pestering me with questions. They didn’t leave even when the delivery truck came, insisted I give them your home address.” He pauses again, this time for a longer time span. “When I didn’t, they became even pushier. Couldn’t shake them off at all, tried harder, somehow ended up on the pavement. Knocked my head hard. One of them called an ambulance. I figured it had something to do with that article about Daniel yesterday,” he continues.

“You saw it?” I ask in surprise.

“Yeah. Any truth in it?”

I shake my head, in no mood to talk about that. All I want is for a doctor to come in and tell me my daddy will be fine.

The nurse returns a few minutes later with the doctor. I immediately spring to my feet, anxious to question the hell out of him, wring out every detail. Briefly I wonder if I can take the doctor to one side, ask him without my dad overhearing. But that’s silly. Dad is not a baby, and this is his health we’re talking about.

Can’t help wanting to protect him from bad news, though. It’s a habit I formed back when Momma was sick. I used to talk to the doctors when Dad wasn’t around, because he burst into tears whenever there was bad news. She had advanced carcinoma. There was always bad news.

“Can you please walk us through everything?” I ask the doctor.

“Of course. We did a physical exam when he arrived. All signs point to a concussion, but a CT scan will remove any doubt of anything more serious, like a brain bleed or a subdural hematoma. We’re keeping him the entire day, anyway. At this age, it’ll be a big risk sending him home. A bleed can develop slowly in patients of a certain age, and it’s best if he’s here if it happens.”

“Now wait a minute,” Dad exclaims. “I just hit the pavement. What’s all that talk about staying the entire day?”

“It’s standard procedure,” the nurse says good-naturedly.